Microfluidic devices have found use in medicine, chemistry and biology, both as analytical monitoring and research tools. Microfluidics feature useful properties, such as low fabrication cost, very low reagent and analyte consumption, fast and controlled mixing, the possibility of fast solution switching and generation and maintaining of chemical gradients etc. Further, microchannels are well suited to address and analyze individual cells, as they can be made on a similar size scale.
Most microfluidic devices handle cells by using pressure or electrical field driven flow, acoustics or optical forces to capture and handle suspended cells from the flow. These devices, however, are not well suited to handle adherent cells, cell cultures such as organotypic tissues or native tissue slices, where cells cannot be transported by flow. Presently, common perfusion tools used in tissue experiments allow poor localization and have large solution consumption.